Governments, businesses, financial institutions, and other goods and services providers provide high speed information transmitting services that enable users to rapidly access information, exchange information, and conduct business. The information transmission services include Web applications, electronic mail, electronic file transfers, and other electronic services that enable users to electronically transmit information. For example, electronic services can be used to conduct electronic funds transfers (“EFTs”), electronic data interchanges (“EDIs”), electronic benefits transfers (“EBTs”), and electronic trade confirmations (“ETCs”). An EFT service allows a payer to electronically debit the payer's account with a first bank and forward credit information to electronically credit a payee's account with a second bank. An EDI service allows transmission-channel users to electronically exchange documents, such as purchase orders, invoices, bills of lading, corporate EFTs, and other documents. An EFT service involves the transfer of public entitlement payments, such as welfare or food stamps, to merchants' accounts so that beneficiaries can purchase goods and services. An ETC service allows for acknowledgement of details regarding securities transactions, such as stock and bond transactions, to be electronically transferred between a buyer and a seller of securities.
Information is typically transmitted between goods and services providers in single transmission channels, such as in channels implemented in wires or optical fibers. FIG. 1 illustrates various transmission channels employed in a transaction between a customer and a merchant. In FIG. 1, directional arrows, such as directional arrow 101, represent single transmission channels that are used to electronically transmit information. A customer 102 can pay for goods or services offered by a merchant 103 by providing debit-card information and other customer information using a merchant Web application. Alternatively, the customer 102 can transmit debit-card information by swiping the customer's debit card through the merchant's 103 terminal. The information is then transmitted to a bank processor 104 that checks the information to determine whether or not the transaction is authentic. When the transaction is determined to be authentic, the bank processor 104 contacts the customer's bank 105 to determine whether or not sufficient funds are available in the customer's bank account. When the information is incorrect or there are insufficient funds available, the bank processor 104 notifies the merchant 103 and the transaction is terminated. When the information appears to be correct and there are sufficient funds available, the bank processor 104 directs the customer's bank 105 to transfer funds to the merchant's bank 106 and notifies the merchant 103 that the transaction has been completed successfully. The merchant 103 then notifies the customer 102 that the transaction has been completed successfully. The debit-card transaction can be typically completed in less than one minute.
Millions of electronic transactions are conducted each day using the same or similar methods as the debit card transaction and depend on reliable transmission channels to exchange information. However, rapid development of methods and systems for transmitting information over transmission channels has created an environment for criminals to target goods and services providers and transmission-channel users. Individual criminals, criminal organizations, terrorists, and adversarial governments have developed innovative methods and systems to maliciously disrupt financial markets, steal funds from financial services providers and individuals, and maliciously deny transmission-channel users access to the transmission channels. As a result of the rise in criminal activities targeting transmission-channel users, an electronic security (“e-security”) industry has emerged. E-security companies have developed computer programs to actively monitor computer-system content and to examine computer systems for potentially destructive routines and computer programs, such as viruses, worms, and Trojan horses. Network-intrusion-detection applications and systems have been developed to monitor network traffic and to alert a system administrator when a malicious user is attempting to gain unauthorized access to a computer system. Cryptographic methods and systems have been developed to protect confidential communications by encrypting data using complex algorithms prior to transmission of the data from a service location to a remote destination and by decrypting received, encrypted information at the remote destination.
In addition to malicious computer-program-based attacks, malicious transmission-channel disruptions pose another kind of potential threat to the security of information-channel users. A malicious transmission-channel disruption is intended to maliciously prevent, intercept, or eavesdrop on information transmissions. For example, in FIG. 1, a criminal may cut or tap into the transmission channel 107 by a physical means, such as by cutting a number of optical fibers or wires, to prevent the customer's bank 105 and the merchant's bank 106 from exchanging funds, leading to delaying or denying transactions between tens, hundreds, thousands, and even millions of customers and merchants. Although methods and systems have been developed to prevent many kinds of malicious computer-program-based attacks on transmission-channel users, designers, manufacturers, and users of transmission channels have been slow to develop methods and systems that, in general, circumvent transmission-channel disruptions. As a result, designers, manufacturers, and users of transmission channels have recognized a need for new methods and systems that can be used to circumvent transmission-channel disruptions.